


Interlude IV

by Guede



Series: Theory [9]
Category: Hornblower (TV), King Arthur (2004)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Bickering, Breaking Up & Making Up, Dating, Derogatory Language, Drunken Confessions, F/M, Families of Choice, Getting to Know Each Other, Gossip, Grief/Mourning, Halloween, Hangover, Humor, Internalized Misogyny, Love Confessions, M/M, Multi, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 08:20:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28348284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guede/pseuds/Guede
Summary: School, work, life. It's a hard act to juggle.
Relationships: Arthur Castus/Guinevere/Lancelot, Galahad (King Arthur 2004)/Mariette (Hornblower), Gawain/Tristan (King Arthur 2004)
Series: Theory [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2058675
Kudos: 3





	1. The Small Tour

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written and posted to LiveJournal in 2005.

Gawain reshouldered his bag, wincing at how the strap cut into his shoulder. He’d just gotten the coursepack for the class for which he was GSI-ing this semester, which had already earned the nickname of ‘The Phonebook’ for obvious reasons. “I swear to God, the freshmen get tinier every year. I can barely carry this thing, so I don’t know how they’ll…Tristan?”

Funny. He could’ve sworn that Tristan had been standing right next to him, but when Gawain turned, the spot beside him was empty. He did a slow spin around, looking for Tristan, but all he saw were clusters of students rushing madly all over the campus. Over by the bookstore was the usual mix of lazy and nervy shoppers consulting crumpled lists, and to the right were some professors warily eying them. Past them and staring Gawain’s way was a pack of…he wasn’t sure about the sexes, because between the baggy all-black wardrobe and the uniformly stringy hair and the bad make-up, they all looked alike.

He raised an eyebrow at them and they all jerked, then scurried away. “Weird…”

“I always wonder why we don’t have more heatstroke cases because of them.”

And Tristan was back, materializing from God knows where since the nearest bit of foliage was yards away. He waited till Gawain was done hopping in surprise, then handed back the random pencils and scraps of paper Gawain hadn’t noticed he’d dropped.

“There you guys are,” Galahad called, jogging up. He slung down his bag as he skidded to a stop so he could stretch his arms over his head. His shirt had disappeared somewhere between when Gawain had kicked his sleepy butt out the door and now.

Across the way, two girls caused a fifteen-student pile-up when they suddenly stopped and their bulging bags didn’t, swinging on to kneecap and trip. Galahad flashed them a grin, dodged Gawain’s blow, and grabbed at his bag. He tried to, anyway. It ended up turning into a two-step heaving process to get the strap back over his shoulder. The girls, who’d moved to a less traffic-heavy position, cooed.

Tristan faintly wrinkled his nose. “The coursepacks aren’t that heavy.”

“You’re not even carrying one. I’ve got _two_ ,” Galahad grunted. Too late he realized his mistake. “So are we done? Can we go eat now?”

“Why two?” It definitely wasn’t out of dedication, and Gawain didn’t think Galahad was doing it because he inevitably vomited on, ripped, or otherwise ruined any coursepack left with him before midterms arrived. Not that Galahad wasn’t smart enough to think of that—he was—but he simply didn’t believe that he’d be so careless.

Galahad ducked his head and rubbed at the back of his neck, mumbling about pizza and celebrating the last day before they had to grade anything.

He had a point about lunch, but that didn’t mean Gawain was going to let the subject change that fast. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen Mariette yet.”

In spite of his tan, Galahad was clearly flushed. He irritably jerked a shoulder at Gawain and started off down the path. “She’s getting over a cold. Cobham was telling me about it and somehow the tricky old bitch got me to volunteer to do Mariette’s shopping.”

“Don’t call Professor Cobham a bitch,” Gawain sighed.

“I thought you and Mariette were dating.” Tristan swung up besides Gawain as they followed Galahad, and before Gawain knew it, he’d been lightened of the bag holding the coursepack.

He was going to say something about that, because Tristan had plenty of bags himself and anyway he shouldn’t let Galahad get to him like that, but Tristan leveled a look at him that said ‘I don’t want to give it back.’ So Gawain let him. And cuffed Galahad on the head once they’d caught up with him.

At least it looked like Tristan had gotten his own back on Galahad, considering how Galahad was glowering and mumbling again. “We aren’t. We _had coffee_.”

Now Tristan was just doing it for fun. He was nearly grinning. “With your reputation, everyone’s learned to assume a second meaning for that.”

“Well, then everyone’s an idiot. We’re not dating. Believe me, every time I see her, she finds some way to remind me that we’re not going to have sex. And anyway, she still throws things at me, so I wouldn’t want to.” The last words were a little under Galahad’s breath, but they still sounded suspiciously wistful. Oh, he was still annoyed by her, but he’d gotten to kiss her at least once if Gawain knew much about people, and he couldn’t just pretend she was a sexless pest. She was an attractive person.

But those two weren’t going to get together on anything but their own terms, so no point in pushing now. Plus when Galahad’s shoulders were hunching like that, Gawain never could help feeling sorry for him. “So about Friday—”

“Can’t. I’m—” Galahad’s jaw defensively jutted out “—consulting with Mariette.”

Okay, now even Gawain couldn’t help himself. “Is coffee involved?”

“Oh, go take your stupid boyfriend and—hey. Where’d he go?” Galahad looked confusedly about them.

So did Gawain, because Tristan had indeed vanished once again. By now they’d walked between a stand of trees, so it wasn’t too hard to guess where he’d gone, but why he’d do that still eluded Gawain. He was pretty sure that the scattered groups of other students and faculty nearby weren’t a threat, and it’d have to be damn serious to make Tristan retreat. But no, all Gawain saw was a couple lecturers he thought were in the English department, some grad students he knew barely well enough to wave to, and a gaggle of goth-ed up undergrads that had spotted the Attic and were chattering excitedly over the weird architecture.

He shrugged and grabbed Galahad’s arm, pulling them down the path. After a moment, he looked to his side and there Tristan was, calm as always.

Gawain reviewed the past couple of minutes and started to formulate a theory.

* * *

Guinevere tucked her arm more firmly through Arthur’s and leaned against him, though they were walking a bit fast for that sort of thing. But he slowed down without asking, looking over in slight concern.

“I’m just enjoying the wonderful weather,” she told him. And it was a lovely day, but the loveliest part was decidedly not related to the state of the skies above.

The girls walking on Arthur’s side all melted, the ones on Guinevere’s side were various shades of green, and as soon as she and Arthur had gone by them, they were nothing but dagger-eyes. She smiled wider and twitched her shoulders so her hair would fall more picturesquely over her back.

“Are you?” Arthur’s expression remained mild, but his eyes moved purposefully from passerby to passerby, clicking down a mental checklist.

They were coming up a short hillock and the slope was getting to be a tad too much for Guinevere’s heels, so she let herself slip off his arm till they were only holding hands. She grinned at him and he briefly returned it before ducking his head, still a little embarrassed by public displays of affection.

“Well, surely it’ll cut down on the chance that one of them will try to blackmail you into a liaison.” Cocking her head, she offered him an innocently concerned smile. Apparently Lancelot had overused his, for all Arthur did was snort and look away. “You’re having your office hours in the library again, aren’t you?”

He nodded and tugged them aside to let a wheelchair-bound man and his friend go by them, the pair chatting too busily to even notice. “And my schedule for my undergraduate philosophy class is the same. I had to give up most of the work for my graduate class to concentrate on putting my sub-department together, so those times you’ll find me in my office.”

Guinevere h’mmed, not quite listening to him.

“That is not an invitation to go invading it whenever you happen to be in the neighborhood,” Arthur hastily added. He hesitated, then sighed. “At least call first, so I can make sure no one else is in the office with me?”

“I always call. You should worry about Lancelot if you’re going to worry about that.” She gave his hand a little swing, just because it was a sunny day and she didn’t have to be back in the office till two. He looked surprised, but after a moment he smiled and pulled up her hand to peck at the back of it.

To the right were two angry mutters—one of them from a man, Guinevere was amused to see—and to the left was one sigh at how romantic it all was. Also from a man, whose female friend looked utterly disgusted with him. She seemed fascinated with Arthur’s hands.

“Speaking of him, is he still held up in Paris?” Arthur asked. He looked at his watch, adjusted his tie and waved to a passing colleague, utterly oblivious to the delight of the girl.

Guinevere snorted. “I can’t understand why Pellew sent him instead of Isolde. Granted, she’s not got two brain cells to rub together, but she doesn’t irritate the French director’s delicate sensibilities. Last I heard, they’d ‘accidentally’ sent the files Lancelot’s supposed to look to Rouen instead. But he should be back by Friday.”

“And how’s your end?” They were coming up on the Philosophy Department now, and he was beginning to look a bit uncertain. Walking around campus was one thing, but walking past Arthur’s fellow professors was another. Especially since at least one of them—Kitty Cobham—seemed cheerfully determined to catch Arthur in the act.

She would have let go of his hand to spare him the decision, but before she could, he tightened his hold on her and squared his shoulders. Then they walked up the steps, Arthur pausing to acknowledge a greeting along the way, and went through the doors.

“I think it’s very good. A little too anxious at times, but overall I’m looking forward to my next case. It’s going to be a long operation—probably lasting till the holidays,” she said, rubbing her thumb over the back of his hand.

“I’ll…try to avoid being out of town often.” He paused again, then leaned forward and kissed her on the corner of the mouth. “Let me just get my briefcase and then we can go.”

* * *

“Sub sandwiches are one of the best foods ever invented,” Galahad groaned. He stretched out in the grass, eyes closed and shirt back on so he wouldn’t sunburn. “So Arthur’s out?”

“Lunch with Guinevere, so Vanora says. Oh, well. I’ll just email him later.” Gawain was about to add that Galahad had better as well, or else he’d botch his first discussion section, but was distracted by Tristan. Or more like the absence of Tristan.

He stood back up and looked around till he spotted the usual black-lipped and –haired girls loitering nearby. Then he tilted his head back till he’d spotted the tell-tale rustle of leaves in the branches above him.

Tristan didn’t appear till the girls had gone, and when he did, he looked a touch…closed up, which was his way of being embarrassed when Galahad was around. He dropped lightly back down besides Gawain and resumed mending his hawking glove. He shifted aside for Gawain to sit down.

“So…” Gawain started.

His reply was an eyebrow-raise.

“Goth girls. Most of them are silly, but then, that’s true for everyone else.” He tapped his fingers on his knees.

For once, Galahad caught on without needing a long explanation. “Hey, if they’re bothering you, just start talking about your thesis. Morgue-work is gross.”

“Not to them,” Tristan muttered. A thread of irritation wove through his words, and he yanked his needle through the leather a bit more roughly than he needed to.

Gawain knew he should be more sympathetic, but his mind would have to give him an image of Tristan scrambling up a building to get away from a bunch of girls. He did his best to hide his smile, but of course Tristan saw it. In apology he ruffled Tristan’s hair, letting his hand stay a little longer on Tristan’s neck than it strictly had to. “Don’t worry. Soon they’ll figure out who Galahad is, and as long as you stay around him, you’ll have no problem keeping them aw—”

He went over, kicking up grass tufts as he did, in a great whirl of streaking colors and Galahad’s cursing. A half-hearted punch, some headlocks, and soon Galahad’s pride had been satisfied enough for them to end the impromptu wrestling bout. Galahad had grass in his hair—so did Gawain, and God knew how long it was going to take for him to pull it all out.

Tristan was laughing quietly at them, needle and thread lying motionless in his hands. “I’m just waiting till they see Arthur. Or the new biology professor.”

“Oh, fuck you both. I’m going,” Galahad declared, pulling himself to his feet. “I—”

“—need to drop that off with Mariette?” Gawain handed Galahad his bag, still grinning.

All he got in reply was the finger. Galahad stalked off, too irritated to even notice that a statuesque blonde was trying to catch his eye.

“I really shouldn’t do that,” Gawain muttered. “He might stop seeing her just to prove a point to me.”

“I think he’s smarter than that. The problem is getting him to realize that when you need him to.” Tristan shrugged and tied off his thread, then snapped it between his teeth. He took a last look around the campus. “It’s full again. No more making out by the fountain at night.”

Gawain choked. When he was done, Tristan passed him a water bottle with a mostly straight face.

“Yeah.” He took a sip and stared at his hands, then at the blue sky. “I’m going to miss that. Especially the sudden run-and-hide from Bors.”

Tristan chuckled again, but he gave Gawain’s hand a tight squeeze when he took back his bottle. After that, they didn’t talk much. Just sat and watched humanity, taking in the last couple of moments before the rush of the school year started.

“If this were a summer fling, I’d dump you right about now,” Gawain suddenly said. He waited till Tristan’s head had jerked up, then smiled reassuringly. “Good thing I’m no idiot, huh. Those girls are going to have to find some other angst-idol.”

Snorting, Tristan let a little teeth dazzle in his smile. “Angst-idol?”

“Old ex of Galahad’s. Long, long story.” Gawain laid back down. After a moment, Tristan flopped down next to him.

“I’m starting on my thesis tomorrow,” he said. He didn’t mention what that meant—one year left for him before he had his degree, if he did everything right, and naturally he would.

Reading up and settling on the topic for his thesis was still where Gawain was, though he was almost done. Even though he didn’t have to do any lab work for his, he still was a good few months away from beginning to write.

Eight months, he told himself. That was plenty of time. A whole academic year before he had to decide on anything. He didn’t have to worry about it now.

Something tapped his arm. When he looked up, Tristan gave a small nod and then curled down in the grass, eyes closing. Gawain watched him, throat suddenly tight. “I’ll wake you in an hour. All right?”

“That’s fine,” Tristan said, and Gawain hoped he was right.


	2. The Grand Tour

There wasn’t much chalk left on the rod, so Arthur forewent chalking up his hands before he broke the balls. It was a cool night and anyway, this floor of Avalon’s student union had disturbingly efficient air conditioning, so his palms weren’t liable to stick too much to the pool stick.

Across the pool table, Tristan stared distractedly out the window. Most people would have said he generally looked that way, but normally his slightly distant gaze was actually keener than most people with a magnifying glass. Right now, however, he leaned on his stick and mechanically ground down the small cube of blue cube on the tip, eyes never moving. They should have been restlessly sweeping the room, and they certainly should have noticed the girl walking past the one glass wall before she let a heavy book slip from her arms.

Tristan flinched at the thud, then turned around. “Solids or stripes?”

“Solids, I think.” Arthur walked around the end of the table and bent over, holding himself lightly above the stick. He let the stick slide through his hands a few times, getting the weight of it—Lancelot had snapped the one Arthur usually brought along during an…energetic closet search, and this was a last-minute loaner from Kitty—before he finally took his shot.

It was a nice, scattering break. The yellow ball clunked off the side and neatly toppled into the left corner pocket at the opposite end, and the red one stopped in just the right position for a bank shot.

“Solids,” Tristan repeated. He stepped out of the way as Arthur moved around.

As busy as their respective lives could get, they didn’t always have time for dinner. But Arthur was determined to stay involved in Tristan’s life, thus the alternative of an hour or so of pool when a meal wouldn’t fit. And pool had a significant meaning for them—back when Arthur was shellshocked and running from his former employers, and Tristan was still grieving over his dead mother, Arthur teaching Tristan to shoot the balls had been one of the few ways they’d been able to approach each other. Since then it’d evolved into a comfortable neutral zone where they could relax, catch up with each other, and privately discuss any issues that might bleed from one life to another.

It’d been a while since Tristan had suggested they play pool instead of have a meal somewhere, so Arthur was closely watching the other man. He grew a little more worried when Tristan didn’t call him on it.

As he leaned over the table for his next shot, Arthur tried and failed to recall if Gawain had acted oddly earlier. Then again, he’d been in a meeting with Merlin all afternoon, so the last time he’d seen Gawain had been just before lunch. “How’s Iseult? I think you mentioned you might be imping a feather for her this week…”

He just missed sinking the red: it rolled sideways a bare inch from the hole and stopped on the rim. Arthur made a note that there apparently was a worn spot in that area and stepped back, waving Tristan forward.

“Oh.” Tristan blinked rapidly and glanced at the new layout of the table. “I did that today.”

“Any trouble?” Arthur asked.

After a quick scan, Tristan marked out his ball and slid into position. “Not much. Bors walked in at the wrong time…”

* * *

Tristan softly cursed as he stared upward, watching how Iseult soared just a little crookedly near the top of the aviary. She dipped towards the rising sun, body a sharp black silhouette against the brilliant reds and yellows so Tristan could see the slight gap in her wing-feathers.

“Sorry, sorry, wasn’t expecting anyone in this early in the morning,” Bors was saying. He knuckled at his forehead and hurriedly backed towards the door. “I’ll just go prune the trees in the other cages first, all right?”

“It’s fine. That’s fine.” It looked like Tristan would be a few minutes late for his dissection session. He wasn’t too bothered since he was ahead of schedule anyway, but he had been hoping to do some extra work. Since the forensic science students shared with the premeds and meds, the schedules for the dissection rooms had gotten very crowded and he doubted he’d have another chance for the rest of the month.

Iseult softly cried out, swooping low. For a moment it looked as if she’d land on a nearby perch, but at the last minute she pulled up into another wide circle. Tristan shrugged and leaned against the wall. He could have gotten out a net, but they’d been together so long that he’d rather wait till she was calm enough to come to his hand.

Anyway, it might be better if he slowed down his work on his thesis. His advisor was constantly asking if Tristan was checking his results and being careful with sources of error—and he was, of course. But it was a little annoying.

Pointless as well, since even if he only worked on it three days a week, he still was going to finish months before Gawain did. Even if he took a couple months off after his defense, there’d still be time. 

His advisor was also starting to shove job openings at him with increasing desperation. He doubted he’d have much trouble finding a job, and he had a much better than even chance of getting one in New York City, but nevertheless, he really should have been seriously looking. The catch about forensic science was that it was mostly teamwork; he’d lucked out with his research, but once he got into the professional field he’d have to work much more with others. Picking the right job generally was more about picking the right lab group than locale, and while locale, lab reputation and starting salary were negotiable factors, lab group personality was a take-it-or-leave-it quality.

Then again, Tristan still wasn’t certain that he wanted to find an opening in the “public” field. He could have a position similar to the arrangement he had with his research if he were to apply to an agency. Follow in his mother’s footsteps.

Arthur had never said so in so many words, but he wanted Tristan to stay…legal. Well, as legal as was possible. And truth be told, Tristan didn’t particularly want to live that deeply in the shadows. He doubted Gawain wanted to, either.

Iseult abruptly stooped and plummeted; Tristan instinctively threw up his arm and she came lightly to him. Her bright eyes peered into his face as he stroked her wings, searching for the broken shaft. She shuffled uncomfortably and he murmured to her, trying to find it as quickly as possible, but she was impatient.

“You don’t like being at someone else’s mercy, either,” he said. And he wanted to take back the words as soon as he’d voice them because that was not how it was like…and yet it was, on some level. It’d been a while since he’d had to wait for someone else to make a decision before he could move.

He was willing to wait. It was only that he was…surprisingly out of practice, Tristan thought.

* * *

Tristan shot down two balls before he banked one a hair short and had to relinquish the table to Arthur. The layout wasn’t spectacular: all the balls were bunched together so no clear shots presented themselves, and the cue ball was barely grazing the eight-ball to boot.

“You still have plenty of money in your trust fund,” Arthur said. He tucked his stick under his arm and stared at the table, working out angles in his mind. “You could afford to wait till you found a good position.”

It wasn’t a real trust fund in the strict definition of the term, but it served the same purpose. It was substantial. But it was only money. Money would keep Tristan healthy and bored. He was paradoxical that way—patient enough to stalk animals…or people…into exhaustion, yet he never was able to simply loaf about. He always needed something to do.

It was a little bit understandable, if part of his reason for being that way was similar to Arthur’s reasons for his restlessness. Sitting around felt like softening up, becoming an easy target.

“How’s the sub-department coming?” Tristan asked. His eyes lingered on the orange solid ball.

That was the one Arthur had settled on as well. He hiked up his stick and carefully aimed, making sure he wouldn’t bang into the light above the table. Just as he was drawing back for the shot, his tie fell over his hands. Arthur barely aborted and sighed, stepping away to unknot it and throw it in the corner chair with his coat. He made himself wait till he’d relaxed; it was just a game of pool, there was no hurry, and he had no reason to be recollecting the advice his training sergeant had once upon a time given him about the proper way to cut down a man from several hundred yards away. “Fine. Slower than I’d like, but the faculty superstructure is in place. I think we’ll have the outlines for majors done by next month.”

The cue ball spun smoothly from Arthur’s stick to reflect off the far wall. It touched the purple-stripe, barely missed the eight-ball as it came back and finally knocked the orange solid into the center left pocket.

Tristan tapped the heel of his foot against the floor. “Slower?”

“Some days I’d like to dramatically introduce Eric Holberg to the concept of speed,” Arthur muttered. He hadn’t been able to set up for the next shot, so once again he was back to peering at the balls and hoping physics would bend just a little.

A soft chuckle drifted over the table. “From a jet plane or the back of a van?”

“I’m trying not to tempt myself. Is Kernyw giving you a hard time?” Arthur finally just picked one at random and did the best he could. He missed, but the resulting scatter did ensure that they wouldn’t be taking random potshots for the next fifteen minutes.

“He’s eager to get his students placed. We all came in at once. He probably wants to get to picking the next bunch.” With a shrug, Tristan calmly knotted himself over the table corner and made an effortless shot. He gracefully straightened himself, a faint hint of satisfaction around his mouth.

Arthur smiled. “If you’re sure. Merlin’s forcing me to attend that damned faculty barbecue this weekend, so I wouldn’t mind…”

“No, I already saw Mark today. I take this one interview and he’ll back off. He’s a little confused, but he took it well.” Tristan propped his hip against the table and stretched over the green felt for his next shot. “The girlfriend probably helps.”

“Girlfriend?”

* * *

Tristan and another man stared at the neat wood-and-glass door labeled as “Dr. Mark Kernyw.” Behind it came an interesting variety of thumps, rustles and moans.

“So. Er. I guess he’s busy?” said the other man.

“New here?” The man’s hair was too neat and the bags beneath his eyes weren’t big enough for him to be a med student begging for more dissection time, so Tristan guessed he must be an incoming forensic science major.

He was proved right when the other man sheepishly nodded. “Yeah. Um…should we…come back later?”

If he wanted to, he could. After having to sneak into class late and then being put in the rare position of asking the person sitting next to him for notes on that part of the lecture, Tristan wasn’t inclined to put up with more inconveniences. Anyway, there wasn’t a point in getting to know all the secretaries if he never asked them for a favor or two.

Luckily, Kernyw’s secretary Lynda was in a mischievous mood. She was a good friend of Vanora’s and for some bizarre reason, she shared Vanora’s opinion that Tristan was “adorable.” He pasted a blank smile on his face, complimented her hairstyle, and ignored the little pats on the arm she kept giving him. Perhaps it kept administrative snarls at bay, but Tristan could never understand how Arthur managed to endure so many inane conversations about blouses, stupid husbands and airheaded teenagers.

“She’s been in there for the best part of the morning,” Lynda snorted. “I think that’s plenty long enough. Honestly, talk about setting a poor example for the students…at least Professor Pendragon has the sense to date professionals—oops, no offense meant, Tristan. But honestly, I’m not even sure _this_ …lady…even has a college degree.”

Tristan mentally reviewed the different stages of decay and pretended he didn’t notice the interested look the other man was sending his way. “Thanks, Lynda.”

“Oh, you’re very welcome, honey. Now let me just find a big stack of files to drop near the door…or oh, I wonder if Dr. Morgan’s in yet. She’s always up for getting Mark’s goose…” Lynda bustled off, still chattering.

In short measure, Tristan had dropped in to have his discussion with a flustered Dr. Kernyw and had convinced him to let matters develop at their own pace. He nodded to a sly-looking Lynda on his way out, thought about taking the door and instead hopped out a convenient window into a tall oak. Lately he hadn’t had time to track the campus squirrels, so he was hoping to make some headway there. They usually knew the best routes into and out of buildings.

He hadn’t been expecting to nearly drop onto Gawain’s head. Tristan swung himself back onto the branch, then looked over the edge. “Did I hit you?”

“Nope. Just…scared the shit out of me,” Gawain laughed. He reshouldered his bag as he peered up into the leaves. “Déjà vu for the second time we met. But anyway, I was kind of hoping to run into you.”

“I thought you had to hold office hours now,” Tristan said, climbing down. A few leaves drifted down with him, their edges already tinged with color. Like a lot of things, fall tended to creep up much earlier than anyone expected.

Gawain shrugged and stepped in beside Tristan. “I switched times with Galahad. Apparently Cobham can’t meet with him any other time for all of this month except for when his hours were scheduled. So anyway, Bed called me this morning saying that he knew about this great apartment…and it turns out it’s actually what he says it is. Wanna come take a look at it?”

“When did you have in mind?” Tristan was still running over the interview he’d agreed to do. It was a bit of a pain, but the interviewer was fairly well-known in the forensic science community, so Tristan wouldn’t have minded meeting him outside of a formal setting. He needed to forward his résumé and fill out the application, which was going to keep him from editing a couple more chapters of his thesis like he’d hoped.

“Next week. Thursday at six.” A pack of girls edged Gawain off the sidewalk; he good-naturedly gave way and eased back to Tristan after they’d passed by. A few were giving him second looks, but he didn’t notice. Instead he was staring at Tristan, barely able to hide his excitement.

The apartment must be fairly impressive, since Gawain normally took everything in stride. Then again, his and Galahad’s current place didn’t have much to recommend it, even considering the average grad student’s living standards. “Thursday…Thurs…I can’t.” And damn Kernyw into the bargain, because towards the end of his talk with Tristan, he’d been getting so irritable that asking for a change in what they’d finally settled on would just result in worse. “I have an interview.”

“An interview?” Gawain asked. He started to shrug it off, but then he realized what Tristan actually meant and did a double-take. “Like a job interview?”

“It’s for a lab in Rochester, so I have to drive up. I’ll probably be gone all day.” The amount of effort Tristan was going to have to put into this stupid side-trip was really grating; he’d just remembered that he’d scheduled some time for a dissection Thursday as well, and now he’d have to rearrange that. And that lab time had been meant for double-checking an important detail for his thesis, which consequently meant he couldn’t touch those two chapters till he’d gotten his lab time. “I’ll be back late—I’m hoping eight o’clock.”

Gawain nodded while looking off into the distance, a curious strain developing around his mouth. When he spoke again, he sounded as if he were trying to fight down a cough. “Okay. Well, too bad. There were actually a couple openings in this place. Two- and…um, three-bedroom apartments.”

“I thought Mariette wasn’t sleeping with Galahad yet,” Tristan said, surprised. He glanced at Gawain’s face, saw the stupefied hurt there, and in a flash the whole conversation came back to him. Only this time it ran without his preoccupation with Kernyw and the interview so Tristan had a wonderful sense of how badly he’d not been hearing things. “I—that—you were going to—”

He tried to hold onto Gawain’s eyes with his own, but the other man ducked to glance at his watch. “Oh, fuck. I’m late—I have to go drop off some stuff with Galahad. Sorry to run, but…”

Tristan grabbed Gawain’s elbow even though he knew he couldn’t fix things in fifteen seconds in the middle of the campus commons. But he could make sure things weren’t _left_ here. “I’ll bring lunch. Sandwiches or pizza?”

“Um, I don’t care—pizza? See you.” Gawain teetered, started to lean forward, and then abruptly pulled away. He took a step backward, looking at Tristan as if he was the one who needed to apologize, and then turned down a side-path with a quick wave.

Damn it to hell.

* * *

“Rochester. Is that the one group…?” Arthur asked. As he did, his cell rang.

Tristan nodded as he stretched over the table, trying for a difficult shot. He’d just begun to open up, but the moment the phone had gone off, he’d clammed up again. Given what he’d been hinting at, it wasn’t going to be easy to get him back to the same state of receptivity.

Arthur fought down an annoyed exhale and dug out his cell. If it was at all possible, he’d just let his voice-mail take it…no, it wasn’t. Caller ID said Lancelot, office phone, and Lancelot only used his office phone when he was calling about serious matters. Every other time, he went with the cell because of the hands-free headset option. “You had to go back to work?”

*Yeah. Some wanker of a Frenchman woke up this morning thinking he’d dump all the info we’ve been wanting for the past two months today. Guin was still around to take it and she pulled out a possible rush job, hence why I’m here.*

Rush jobs generally meant emergency intercepts where Interpol had an opportunity to catch contraband in situ. As far as Arthur knew, Lancelot and Guinevere were on a long-term project to reduce the amount of illegal diamonds smuggled into the country, so Arthur would have to ask them afterward who was involved. Unfortunately, there was a better chance he’d recognize a name in that business than in the artwork smuggling that they’d been investigating before. “Are either of you going to be around for the weekend?”

*Sunday night, maybe. Guin needs to make a run home for clothes and things, so you might catch her tomorrow. I’ve got extras here at the office, so I’m fine.*

“All right. Tell her I’ll try to start putting things together for her.” Arthur watched Tristan calmly sink two more balls and then move around to aim at the eight-ball. “Good luck.”

Lancelot let out a tired laugh. *Can I talk you into giving me a more demonstrative form of that?*

Well, it was good to hear that he wasn’t completely exhausted yet. On the other hand, it was damnably embarrassing to blush in front of Tristan. “I’m out with Tristan.”

*Oh, Christ. Never mind then, quasi-incestuous voyeurism isn’t really something I go for…see you when I get back.*

“Likewise,” Arthur dryly said. He could see Tristan’s shoulders shaking a bit as the other man tried to restrain himself. He flipped his cell shut and walked back to the table.

Tristan missed his shot, but didn’t seem unduly troubled by it. Actually he looked downright amused. “Don’t you ever get tired of Lancelot’s little suggestions?”

“You couldn’t hear that, could you?” Arthur chalked up his tip as he mapped out one possible series of shots in his head. His finger slipped and he accidentally snapped a nail into the ball of his thumb—not deeply enough to bleed, but it hurt enough for him to need a moment. The moment was actually quite helpful, since it suddenly occurred to him that he could answer Tristan’s question and possibly sneak in a little bit of advice at the same time. “I suppose I would if it was anyone other than him. For some reason his imperfections are charming.” That came out a bit wry. “Or if they aren’t charming, they’re something I can live with at the end of the day. Perfection would be…suspicious.”

They were eight-ball to two, so Arthur took his time sinking his first one. The second ball was a little trickier, but it teetered too far on the edge of the hole and finally tipped in, which left the eight-ball.

“Anyway, he puts up with my neuroses—and don’t comment, I have the more recent psych profile—so I can hardly begrudge him a few quirks of his own. If either of us did, there’d be no point in pursuing a serious relationship.” The slightest tap and Arthur sent the cue ball lazily over the table where it ricocheted off the wall. When it finally hit the eight-ball, that black sphere languidly sauntered towards the pocket.

Teeter. Teeter. Arthur looked heavenwards.

_Clunk_.

“That puts us even for games,” Tristan said in a neutral tone. He laid his stick across the table and started to re-rack the balls. His fingers deftly retrieved about half of them, but then they let one slip free so he had to chase it around the table. “So how fast does Lancelot forgive you?”

“I can’t generalize something like that. It depends…well, firstly on how bad the damage is.” Arthur glowered at the sly look Tristan shot him. “No, following him into the bathroom doesn’t solve everything, and I do _not_ want to know how you found out about that time in the Met’s men’s room. I just want to know that no one else has.”

Tristan carefully lifted the plastic triangle off the balls and set it aside. “No one else has.”

Thank God. Even now, Arthur still had a difficult time walking through the Arms and Armory exhibit without turning red. “And secondly,” he said, positioning the cue ball, “He usually has to wait for me to forgive myself first.”

Not that Lancelot _waited_ , of course—his patience had been short when Arthur had first met him, and it’d not gotten any longer. He generally lost his temper over that before he’d even finished being upset at whatever Arthur had done in the first place. Guinevere preferred the cold shoulder when she wanted to force Arthur to talk to her.

It was rather funny, Arthur thought. He could spot and dissect a strategy to manipulate him without any difficulty, but he had the damnedest time avoiding their snares anyway.

“I don’t think Gawain’s waiting,” Tristan abruptly said. He startled Arthur into smacking the cue-ball sideways so it completely missed the other balls; Arthur started to move away, but Tristan waved him back for a second try. “I had lousy follow-up.”

* * *

Pizza wasn’t really a food Tristan liked—it tended to be too greasy for him—so he sat back on the couch and watched Gawain and Galahad chow down. He always noticed minor details, but now they were skipping out at him, a testament to his nerves. His fingers actually twitched halfway to the threads hanging off the ends of his jean cuffs before he caught himself.

Gawain had sat next to him without any real hesitation, but there was about an inch between Tristan’s crossed legs and Gawain’s hip. And Gawain seemed engrossed in taking notes off the Introduction to Philosophy coursepack.

“Hey, so did Gawain talk to you about the apartment?” Galahad asked.

The air winced. “Yeah, I did,” Gawain mumbled. “Fuck, I don’t want to grade papers three weeks into the semester.”

“It’s a page-long outline for their first term paper. It’s not bad compared to the essay quiz Holberg wanted to give.” Galahad opened his mouth wide, chomped off a corner of pizza and pulled the slice away from himself so the cheese stretched in strings. He twirled them around his finger till they snapped, then scraped those into his mouth. “You coming to see the place, Tristan? The apartments have actual dishwashers. No more bleeding fingers for me.”

“No.” Tristan glanced at Gawain, but the other man still refused to look at him. It probably didn’t help that Galahad was cheerfully oblivious to the whole situation. If he’d just leave, then maybe Tristan could explain about earlier. “I like washing my own dishes.”

One of Gawain’s shoulders moved rapidly forward and back, as if he were shrugging off a strap. His scribbling sped up. “It was just a thought.”

He sounded sharp enough for Galahad to shoot him a questioning glance. When Gawain didn’t explain himself, Galahad looked at Tristan, but Tristan didn’t feel like detailing everything to him, either. “Thanks, but you didn’t have to,” Tristan quietly said.

“Yeah, I guess not. Rochester, huh? You can probably hire someone to do your dishes.” There was a sudden, short tearing noise: Gawain had ripped up his notepad with his pen tip. He exhaled irritably, then tossed down that and his pizza, which splattered some more of his notes with grease. Then he was over the back of the couch and stalking towards the door before Tristan could catch him.

But Tristan was only a second behind, and a little annoyed himself at Gawain’s crack. Both of them knew science wasn’t a high-paying field, and it wasn’t as if Tristan had ever given the impression that he looked down on Gawain. “I’m just going to an interview. I’m not getting a job there.”

“So you just do interviews for fun? That’s a pretty weird job-hunting strategy,” Gawain called over his shoulder. As Tristan sped up, so did Gawain so they banged through the hallway with roughly the same separation.

“It’s not a job-hunting strategy. It’s just something I have to do—I didn’t ask you to look for apartments for me. Am I supposed to have you approve everything I do for my Master’s?” Which was entirely the wrong thing to say, but it’d been there in the bottom of everything and of course it came out at the wrong time. The one to whom Tristan should’ve been justifying his professional choices should have been Mark, but Mark had been wanting to get back to his damned girlfriend so Tristan had had to bottle that up.

Gawain wasn’t a target. He wasn’t, even if he’d apparently made an assumption that Tristan wished he hadn’t; Tristan wasn’t angry, exactly, but he was—

\--about to run into Vanora. He pulled up short at the last minute and grabbed for the stack of papers she was about to drop, then dodged around to keep going. But Gawain was already out of sight, and now that Tristan thought about it, maybe he should just let the other man go. Neither of them were capable of fairly holding up their end of the discussion.

Vanora took one look at his face, rocked back with one hand on her hip and jerked her chin at the hall. “Go, you idiot. You _never_ leave an angry man hanging, is what I’ve learned in fifteen years of marriage…”

* * *

“But he was already out of the building. I tried to find him later, but couldn’t.” For the second straight time, Tristan missed his shot. His expression wasn’t any more disturbed than it was normally, except possibly for a trace of self-denigration, but he’d definitely grown more upset over the past few minutes. Now he stepped back with an audible sigh and swung to eye the window again.

It took more than a moment for Arthur to decide how he wanted to answer. Actually, it probably took him a minute just to deal with the revelation that Tristan and Gawain had progressed that far along. He spent part of it mentally reviewing the sections of Avalon’s ethical guidelines that might be relevant, and the rest he spent reminding himself that Tristan and Gawain were grown men. “Did you consider the possibility that he’s avoiding you because he doesn’t know how to start the conversation?”

“I know I could have found him if I wanted to, but that defeats the point, doesn’t it?” Tristan pulled at his hair, then swept it out of his face. “Arthur—did you let Lancelot and Guinevere stay because you wanted them to, or because you were too polite to kick them out?”

“I think I met them under unusual circumstances. They’d nearly died and thinking about that terrified me for a long time—of course it still terrifies me, but not quite so…immediately. It’s hard to think past that, given everything.” And by that, Arthur meant his past experiences and losses, the instincts that those had painfully and to some extent, ineradicably hard-wired into them, and the sheer shock of finding out that he could in fact still fall in love. He had no idea how he’d word that properly, so he trusted that Tristan would understand enough from tonal cues.

Reading Tristan was difficult under the best of circumstances, but when Tristan was agitated, it actually was harder since Tristan and agitation didn’t coincide often enough for Arthur to identify many patterns of behavior. Right now, about all Arthur had to go on was that Tristan seemed more likely to make this shot than he had his two previous ones.

He didn’t. But he only missed by a hair; the ball had stopped on the very edge of the pocket, and Arthur almost felt guilty about taking and making his shot. He’d even managed to set up a good second shot to follow that one. “I suppose what you need to know is that living together isn’t something done lightly.”

“I don’t think he was thinking of it as a fun thing to do. That’s the problem,” Tristan muttered.

More or less. He’d been looking at things flippantly, whereas Gawain had been looking at them seriously. It didn’t matter that they’d been considering different matters; their perspectives hadn’t matched up, and that was why they’d misunderstood each other when their viewpoints had crossed.

Arthur started to lean over for his next shot, then straightened up. He waited until Tristan was steadily looking at him. “Were you? If not, then just go find him and talk—there’s no _point_ at all to who starts first if you never start at all. Moral principles are only of use if they’ve an arena in which they can be aired…and someone’s at the door.”

“Uh, yeah. Hi.” Galahad’s head poked around the corner. His hair was rumpled and he had a careworn, exasperated look that only partly evaporated when he saw Arthur. “Vanora said you two might be here…and God, does everyone owe me for doing this. Tristan, come on. I have a roommate that’s been ripping up car engines for the past three hours and Bed’s starting to run short on things for him to fix.”

Tristan lowered his stick, but stayed where he was. “He’s at the garage?”

“Are you going or what? He’s really fucking depressed, and if you’re not I’m just going to whack him with a wrench and drag him back to the…okay. Wait. You don’t need to—hey!” Galahad swore, then ran into the room and past the pool table to stare out the window. He leaned over the sill for a few seconds before turning to stare at Arthur. “So…you ever get used to him jumping out windows, or do you always freak out for a moment before realizing he’s not actually committing suicide?”

Arthur quietly let his grip on his stick relax and breathed an inward sigh of relief. “Option B.”

“Seriously?” After shutting the window, Galahad wandered back to the pool table where he picked up the stick he’d dropped. He ran a hand through his hair, then shook his head hard as if he were dizzy. “Jesus Christ. Everyone’s such a drama queen. Three-bedroom, hell. It’d still only be two-bedroom in practice, and I’d have to fall asleep with headphones on. Not that anyone’s really asking for my opinion…”

“Did you mind?” Arthur asked. He looked at the abandoned game, then went ahead and finished his turn. The red-stripe neatly banked into a pocket, while the cue ball rolled on till it was angled to send the blue-stripe into the opposite hole. He might as well play out the game, since it wasn’t as if he had anything besides work to greet him at home. Once upon a time that wouldn’t have bothered him, but he was no longer living in once upon a time.

“Uh…well, no. Aside from having to deal with animal guts in the fridge and that kind of thing. Actually, Gawain’s easier to take when Tristan’s around—not so uptight and fussy.” Galahad cocked his head as Arthur shot and missed, then waved vaguely at the table. “So…need a partner?”

Arthur paused, then smiled and stepped aside. “If you like. I didn’t know you played.”

“I don’t just play—I used to get good income from this,” Galahad snorted. “You still sure you want me to?”

“And here I thought it was all video games and Texas Hold ‘Em nowadays.” A little exercise against an unfamiliar opponent shouldn’t hurt, Arthur thought. And it’d certainly distract him from his empty house. “Take your best shot.”


	3. The Art of Roasting

Arthur stared into his cup of…he supposed it was punch. It had the right color and the right faintly fruity smell, and when he sloshed it about, the consistency was also correct, but he remained wary. Perhaps it was only mid-afternoon and at thirty-six he was among the youngest present, but that didn’t necessarily mean there couldn’t be surprises. Faculty barbecues tended to be excuses for all sorts of stupidity to come out.

He winced and hoped the inner-Lancelot he’d developed wasn’t showing too badly. The events were good for bringing together faculty members from all departments. They nurtured the tight-knit, interdisciplinary atmosphere for which Avalon College—officially a University, but no one called it that—was rightly known. They did have a point.

When they weren’t boring, they were incredibly annoying.

“Ready to jump the fence yet?” Kitty strolled up with cup in hand. She was about two yards away and closing in, but Arthur could already smell a distinct tang. She grinned at his raised eyebrow. “It’s a touch of gin. Preventative measure—I believe a forensics professor made up the drinks this time, and I don’t trust them to have washed their hands first. Want any?”

“No, I’m fine.” Occasionally Arthur regretted being responsible, but it had to be done. He screwed up his courage and took a sip. “Taken straight, it’s not entirely horrible.”

Laughing, Kitty tucked her arm through his and started to usher him towards the fountain, presumably because the tinkling of the water would drown out her bitingly witty remarks. She squeezed his arm. “I do love your sense of understatement. And how are matters with you and your brood? I’ve been so busy lately that I haven’t even had a chance to pester Mariette or the secretaries for the gossip. Which cat did you bring with you?”

It took a moment for Arthur to remember the reference, but fortunately by that time, they had made it to the fountain so his stifled laugh wasn’t overheard by many.

“The more socially acceptable one?” Kitty suggested, a touch of serious query inserting itself into her voice.

Arthur shot her a look. “The one that wasn’t working.”

“Oh, you know I’m joking.” She patted his arm as she scanned the milling crowd, looking past the group of decidedly drunken biology professors and the blonde from…Anthropology?...that had attempted to attach herself to Arthur earlier.

“I know _you_ are.” Come to think of it, where had Guinevere gone? After the second time she’d scared a white-haired old fool senseless, she’d muttered something about finding the bathroom. But even Lancelot trying to gel down his hair didn’t take this long.

Kitty clucked her tongue. “And is that resentment I hear from our resident gentleman? Surely not.”

“Does Guinevere look like a grad student? Actually, it doesn’t matter. Those idiots shouldn’t be leering at grad students, either,” Arthur muttered. He’d knocked back the rest of his punch before he’d even noticed.

“Tsk. If you’re going to be all darkly bitter and handsome like that, you should do it with this.” Before he could move his cup, she’d topped it up with gin. Her smile said not to thank her.

“Oh, Arthur!” caroled a familiar voice.

The one disadvantage of standing by the fountain was that it was relatively centered, so fleeing unwelcome visitors was impossible. Arthur flinched, hunched his shoulders, and then swung himself around to face Morgan, the one forensic science professor about whom Tristan had anything complimentary to say. Of course, he wasn’t her type.

She was certainly an attractive woman, and with her formidable intellect also had to possess more than her share of drive to have gotten tenure so early in her career. But nevertheless Arthur found his hackles rising ever so slightly whenever she came around. Possibly it was her way of looking at him like she wanted to bite down hard. “Morgan. It’s always nice to see you.”

“It’s always nice to hear you say that, even though I’m sure you don’t mean it.” Her tone was light and so were her eyes, but not from ignorance. She liked seeing men squirm. “You know, you’re the hottest talk of this little gathering. We finally get to meet the lovely unknown you’ve been squiring around for the past few months.”

“Guinevere?” Kitty raised her eyebrows and smiled with her lips together. “Dear me, but she’s quite the regular around my end of campus. Why, I even know how she likes her cream.”

On Arthur’s neck, and God, he’d thought he’d shut the door tighter that time. But now was not a good time to blush, so he fought it down. He also wrestled away the urge to just make a break for Merlin, who was walking by with some important alumni who’d dropped in. “I’ll be sure to pass the compliment along to her.”

“I’d think the compliment of having you all to herself would be enough to keep any girl spinning,” Morgan purred. When she leaned forward, she surreptitiously twitched her low-cut blouse southwards.

Arthur stared into her eyes. “She doesn’t, actually. Lancelot couldn’t make it, or else you’d have met him as well.”

Well, at least this barbecue had gotten Arthur a look at what a flustered Morgan was like. She blinked rapidly, frozen awkwardly in place. Then she leaned back and narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing his face. “Lancelot? Isn’t two boyfriends a bit greedy of her?”

“Not really. He’s more mine than hers,” Arthur said in a carefully modulated voice. He sipped casually at his gin and watched Morgan put the pieces together. She was, after all, a highly intelligent woman.

Morgan opened her mouth, closed it, and then nodded stiffly. “How very sophisticated of you. A pleasure, but I see my department head wants a word…”

Kitty was damn near cackling as Morgan made her exit. “Now tell me you don’t get a tiny bit of a kick out of doing that. I utterly adore your take on ‘I cannot tell a lie’ sometimes.”

“I’m glad someone enjoyed that, then. It’s getting rather tiresome for me.” And to be entirely truthful, Arthur still wasn’t altogether comfortable with discussing it so nonchalantly. He was certainly not going to lie or hide, as Kitty had observed, but he didn’t yet have a clear explanation for it all formulated. He wasn’t even sure how to refer to Lancelot and Guinevere: ‘boyfriend’ or ‘girlfriend’ struck him as too topical, but ‘significant other’ was too depersonalized. ‘Lover’ was simply too romantic, considering their personalities.

“I know.” For a moment, the glow faded from Kitty’s face and the years came to the forefront. After all, she’d gotten her divorce back when women had still been fired for such social transgressions. Then she tilted her head and smiled up at Arthur. “You do realize that that’s only temporarily set Dr. Fay back, don’t you? Morgan’s much more resilient than, say, the poor fawning undergrads in your classes.”

Arthur grimaced and allowed himself another sip of gin. Every year said undergrads seemed to resort to even more ridiculous clothing to get his attention, and every year he had to book a section of the u-brary so he could hold office hours without enabling some kind of compromising situation. “Well, at least this year my grad students are drawing off some of them.”

Dimples formed in Kitty’s cheeks as she downed some of her drink; she had an astonishing capacity for her diminutive size. “Oh, I know. Mariette’s come in annoyed more than once. Though of course she’ll deny it’s about that if asked. I’m curious—does Galahad also keep claiming that it’s only coffee?”

“He’s stopped answering that question.” Thankfully enough, because Mariette’s parents did keep in touch with Arthur and did keep asking probing questions about their daughter’s love life. In that situation, Arthur felt that some omission of truth was more fair to Mariette, but he did appreciate how much easier Galahad’s silence made holding to that principle for him. “I think it annoys Tristan as well, but so far no animal guts have turned up in students’ dorms.”

“And how is Tristan? I…” Kitty paused “…Bors told Vanora who told me an odd story about Tristan jumping out of a window a few nights ago.”

Frankly, Arthur didn’t really know. He didn’t ask, either, though of course he was quite worried about that situation. That was because he deemed it an unprofessional mixing of private and professional life—if they were still fighting, he didn’t want details so he wouldn’t be forced to choose. “Gawain seems all right, and Galahad’s not pestering him about anything from that corner, so I think they’re fine. Mostly. The idea of moving in together had come up.”

Kitty hummed and waited for him to go on. Across the lawn, Guinevere emerged from an admiring group of humanities lecturers and walked towards the fountain, sun binding gold into the dark waves of her hair. She looked tense beneath the dazzling smile.

“Gawain jumped a bit ahead of himself—accidentally.” Arthur glanced at the fountain, then poured the rest of his gin into it when he was sure that Bors had moved out all the goldfish that had used to live in there. “I don’t think Tristan would mind, except…it goes back to his mother, a little.” Since Kitty didn’t know anything but the innocuous about Arthur’s past profession, he took a moment to edit history. “She had a job that made them move a lot, and he never really had a choice in the matter. Or in…I hate to speak ill of the dead, but some of the men she let live with them were less than ideal.”

“Ah. Boy forgot to ask. Well, that’s a problem easily fixed once the pride’s out of the way. And I don’t think Gawain would have much of an issue there—he’s a nice young man,” Kitty said with mock-primness. “The important thing is that they talk.”

“Yes, well, Tristan doesn’t often talk about his mother to anyone. And I include myself there.” Which was why Arthur occasionally itched to intervene, but if he did that, he’d lose—rightfully—any trust he’d gained with Tristan over the years. When Tristan wanted to talk about something, he talked about it. Trying to hurry that only led to booby-traps in the bathroom, and that room was dangerous enough when Lancelot and Guinevere fought over it in the morning.

Speaking of, Guinevere had finally extricated herself from her followers and was hooking her arm through Arthur’s. She pressed close in a rather indecent manner…at least according to Merlin’s look at Arthur. Merlin could have an archaic view of etiquette sometimes.

“And I think that’s my cue to let you two elope,” Kitty muttered, having also spotted the Dean. “Hope my colleagues didn’t bother you too much, Guinevere.”

“Only when they were trying to stare down my blouse, or up my skirt. Have you been keeping Arthur free of irritations?” Guinevere murmured, more to Arthur than to Kitty. Her hand was starting to roam.

Arthur delicately shifted so it dropped away and began looking for a reasonably secluded area. Not because he was necessarily going to join the ranks of the rude and lusty, but because Guinevere tended to get physically flirtatious when she was feeling insecure and he probably should get away from the crowd before he found out which of the faculty he’d want to strangle. “I’ll see you tomorrow at lunch, Kitty.”

“Try not to break anything,” was Kitty’s amused response.

Guinevere stayed close and cuddly all the way out of the Dean’s garden. It was a weekend, but midterms were starting so there were rather a lot of students on campus. After a moment’s consideration, Arthur directed them towards the Conservatory. “You don’t have to go to any more of these if you don’t want to.”

“Oh, I’m coming to at least one more. I want to watch Lancelot rip into those damned…” She glanced up at Arthur, then smiled in a more relaxed manner and let her head rest briefly on his shoulder. “No, I’m fine. No need to get into your shining armor and mount up on my behalf. I took care of myself.”

“That, I don’t doubt,” Arthur said, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. The side-door of the Conservatory’s greenhouse was propped open, so he led them through that and into the flowery section. “You really think Lancelot deserves to experience that? I know you’ve been irritated with him lately, but even I try not to go to these more than four times a year.”

She made a face and tugged him to a stop. Then she slowly came around to face him, taking both his hands in hers. “I overheard this woman named Morgan complaining about you,” she murmured, tipping up her head.

“Don’t do anything to her,” Arthur snorted. “Tristan thinks she’s the only forensics professor that cares more about the students—”

A few strands of her hair were trapped between them as they kissed. They smelled better than the flowers, and she certainly tasted better than the punch or the gin.

After a moment, Arthur put up his hands to cradle her face and pull her closer. Her hand bumped at his arm and he moved it so she could stroke over his chest, slow and firm. His breath caught and he suddenly found himself kissing harder, deeper, and Guinevere rose to meet him instead of asking him to ease off. In a matter of moments, they were dangerously near to ruining their clothes on a pile of potting-soil bags.

“Bors—is probably in here somewhere,” Arthur panted, barely holding himself back.

“And I like this skirt.” Guinevere’s eyes were sparkling as she pretended to survey the situation.

A low brick wall held back a raised bed beside them. She tossed one arm around his neck and suddenly she was laughing, tossing her foot up onto the wall so she could wrap her other leg around his waist. Her foot slid off almost immediately, but by then his hands were holding her skirt clear of the soil and she was pulling at her pantyhose so she could perch on the wall without getting them dirty. It was utterly mad and reckless, and Arthur couldn’t stop himself from burying his head in her breasts. He rubbed his nose against them like an over-eager teenager while his fingers played over her cunt and hers over his fly till suddenly they were crushed into joining, kissing messily.

“Have to be fast,” Guinevere gasped, giggling. Then she sucked in a breath and clutched at his shoulder, yielding and unbreakable at the same time. It was a combination Arthur always found irresistible.

About ten minutes later, when they were hastily trying to make themselves decent, she smiled lazily and sighed. “God, I needed that. Work’s been absolute hell. Oh, but we’ve got a name now, so I can complain in specifics. Benedict Clayton.”

The greenhouse was normally on the steamy side, and their recent activities had only enhanced that, but nevertheless Arthur felt a bit chilly. He concentrated on doing up his tie. “Clayton?”

“Know him?” Guinevere idly asked. Her pantyhose had developed a short run and she was preoccupied with trying to adjust her skirt to cover it.

“I know of him.” Which was true enough. Arthur hadn’t heard from him in ten years. But it was surprising…Ben had been a good, morally upright man who’d believed that medical treatment should be offered to everyone, even those that worked crimes in the government’s name. A decade could see a good deal of alteration in a man, but nevertheless…a diamond-smuggling ring? Arthur would have to look into it.

Guinevere shrugged and pecked Arthur on the cheek. “Well, we’re doing fine so far, so I don’t think we’ll be needing any inside information. Just go on enjoying the perks of academia.”

In light of her warm eyes, he couldn’t do anything else but shake off his chill. “Like faculty parties?”

“Like debauchery on university property,” she shot back. “Now, did I taste gin on you? I think I’d better have another try, just to carry out proper due diligence…”


	4. Five Miles and Candy Corn

“Sometimes reading hurts me,” Galahad muttered. He laid back on the couch and put the coursepack over his head like a tent. That way, the knowledge stored within its pages would hopefully drip into his brain without him ever actually having to suffer looking through it. It was a long shot, but Halloween wasn’t that far away, and besides, it was a full moon tonight.

Papers rustled. Some squirrel dive-bombed a student below the window and the resulting mad chittering and yelping entertained Galahad for a couple seconds. Mariette started tapping her fingers on her pen-cap again.

“What are you talking about?” she finally asked.

“The examples of wordplay—the one for palindromes. ‘Sex at noon taxes’? Christ. That’s more than I ever wanted to know about whoever wrote that section.” Seriously, textbooks were meant for learning, not for showcasing how bad the ivory tower was at cracking jokes. If Galahad wanted humor, he had cable TV. “I’m already hearing it. Half my discussion group’s going to snicker, and the other half—”

“—will lean forward and stick their boobs out at you,” Mariette sniped.

Galahad took the binder off his head and looked at her. Somewhere along the line, she’d finally come up with a pair of jeans and was curled up in a nearby chair, marking up the midterm essays. She’d pulled back her hair into a high, loose ponytail that could’ve used some curls around her face, but it was still just about the most casual Galahad had ever seen her.

She moved her hair to brush back the one tendril that had dared work itself loose and caught him staring. “The laundry room in my apartment building is flooded.”

“It’s not like I was complaining. I like girls in jeans.” He quickly put up the binder to deflect the pen she threw at him, then rolled into a sitting position. “What? It’s a compliment!”

“We’re not—”

Rolling his eyes, he reached out for a fresh stack of papers. “—having sex. Yeah, whatever.” Galahad scooped her pen from the floor and uncapped it, then glanced down the top paper. He spotted two spelling mistakes and a crash-collision with semi-colons in the first paragraph alone and groaned. “God, I don’t want to do this. It’s only half a day till Halloween.”

“Two days.” She finished another one and dropped it on the stack on the floor beside her chair, then held up the next one. Her eyebrows drew together in a pained grimace. A little bit of her tongue poked out from between her tightly compressed lips as she fought with her sense of dedication.

Grading freshmen writing had to be the universal soul-crusher, because after a moment, Mariette let her head fall on the back of the chair and her arm swing down to the side. She swore in French.

“Yeah, exactly. I should be out stocking up on vodka and Jell-O. Or trying to pry Gawain out of his funk. Or hell, both. They do kind of go together…and it is half a day. Screw it that Halloween’s on a Monday this year—today’s Friday. I’m starting this afternoon.” It couldn’t be that many papers left on the table. The Intro to Philosophy class was pretty much required for every freshman coming through Avalon, but it had two GSIs per professor that was involved and that should have ended up dividing into smaller chunks for each. There was no fucking way there was that many.

A peek through his fingers showed Galahad that yes, there was that many. Or…he riffled the pile in his lap, then blinked. Okay, so the paper was there, but the number of staples seemed improbably low.

“Dieckmann gave them a _suggested_ paper length,” Mariette wearily explained. “I just finished a twenty-pager.”

“Fucking hell.” Well, that was yet another reason to hate Dick-man. Even Arthur, champion of individuality that he was, understood that maximum paper lengths were a necessary restriction on the average college student’s incredible ability to bullshit.

According to the wall-clock, Galahad had another three hours to go. He groaned again and slowly made his first mark on the top paper. He’d made another six before he had to give in and flip through to see how many pages were left.

Mariette made a weird noise. When Galahad looked up, she was poking at the floor with her shoes. “Want to make out?” she asked stiffly.

Galahad was already over. A couple frantic, messy, surprisingly _hot_ moments later, he pulled back to grin breathlessly at her. His fingers twirled a piece of her hair. “Hey, you’re catching on. Best kind of procrastination, or what?”

“You are so annoying.” But she wasn’t exactly pushing him away. Actually, she seemed pretty interested in getting his neck back. “Why is Gawain in a funk? Is this still about that thing that no one will tell me about?”

“What thing?” Galahad snorted, leaning in. He wasn’t exactly surprised when she moved away, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t annoyed. “You know it’d be really clichéd and reflect badly on women if you were to try and bribe me to gossip about Gawain with sex.”

She wrinkled her nose and pushed at him. Thanks to the wideness of the chair, she didn’t manage to force him off, but they had an uncomfortable few minutes of elbowing and squirming before they’d figured out how to fit both their asses in it. Mariette finally gave up on trying to close in Galahad’s sprawl and huffily perched on top of him.

“I’m worried. I _like_ him, so I want him to be all right,” she said, trying to fix her hair. A ridiculous number of bobby-pins came out of her hair before she realized she was just going to have to take down the whole thing and redo it. “He’s moping.”

“He is not. He’s just being nervous as hell all the time. I opened the window this morning and he nearly freaked out when it squeaked. I was _this close_ to getting a faceful of half-cooked eggs.” Galahad held up his hand and illustrated his point.

Mariette wrinkled her nose at it and slapped down his hand, then shoved a handful of pins into it. While she was rewinding the band around her ponytail, Galahad casually let a couple of the pins slip to the floor. With any luck, the rabid dustbunnies would steal them and…and then probably take them back to Tristan, their God and supreme leader.

God, Galahad hated drama. He’d tolerated Tristan—with a lot of patience on his part, even if Gawain would beg to differ on that—because Tristan tended not to start that kind of shit, unlike some of Gawain’s other boyfriends. “You know, I don’t get it. They went and had some talk so I couldn’t come home for the whole goddamn night, but they’re still weird around each other. And Bed’s…put it this way—he wasn’t named after the high quality of his spare bed. Worst sleep I ever had.”

“Really?” Mariette snorted. She obviously didn’t believe him. “Wait, so they talked and you weren’t there? So you don’t actually know what’s going on with them?”

“Hey, stop trying to pry.” Galahad handed her the pins and watched as she struggled to pin down everything in sight. He had to snicker at how frustrated she got.

She turned around and looked at him.

He stared back. “This is where you tell me to get off and go back to grading, right?”

And indeed, it was, but now that he’d said that, she couldn’t say it. Her cheeks reddened with frustration as she stabbed her last few pins in place. “So we should take him out.”

“Gawain or Tristan?” Galahad facetiously asked. But actually, that wasn’t a bad idea. There was no way Galahad was staying in Friday night, but this year he couldn’t do what he normally did and try to hit every single club in town.

Well, he could, but with Gawain the way he was, the kind of hang-over support Galahad would get wasn’t going to be all that great. And Mariette would bitch, even though they were mostly making out in tiny individual study rooms and not really a couple. And the tiny voice in Galahad’s head would whine, too—it had no problem with him playing around as long as it was serial and not simultaneous, and it’d apparently decided Mariette sorta counted as the current…whatever. Considering Galahad hadn’t even seen Mariette’s breasts, he was going through an awful lot of trouble for her.

“Which one’s free?” Mariette was serious. “I told my parents I’d stay with safe friends and not wander into dangerous parties.”

“I thought your parents had met Tristan,” Galahad muttered, pushing out of her chair. He stubbed his toe around till he’d found where his pen had gone, then bent over to pick it up. “And I am _not_ safe.”

“I was talking to my _parents_.” For once, Mariette sounded like the average weary young adult instead of a stridently insecure girl. “Do you ever stop being so vain?”

Galahad refused to dignify that with an answer. “Gawain’s free. I have no idea about Tristan. He’s probably hanging out in the trees, figuring out how to drop water balloons on unsuspecting trick-or-treaters.”

* * *

Arthur picked up a box of chocolates and scanned the list of contents for raspberry-filled ones. There were only three, so he put it back and continued looking. “Tristan, I sincerely hope that bag doesn’t have a package of balloons in it. Merlin’s very close to figuring out who annually bombards the drunk undergrads on Halloween.”

“He’s still two Halloweens away from having concrete proof, and I won’t be here next year.” A nearby display of haunted-house equipment had caught Tristan’s attention. He fingered some particularly realistic rubber rats in a way that made Arthur nervous. “I won’t be here,” Tristan repeated more softly.

Then again, possible midnight pranks were minor things compared to the ongoing issue between Tristan and Gawain. The initial incident seemed to have been forgiven and smoothed over, but Arthur had a suspicion that the concerns it’d raised weren’t dying away so easily. Certainly Gawain hadn’t seemed as sunny for the past two weeks, and he’d been letting Galahad get away with so much that Galahad had actually stopped trying to pull things over Gawain.

“Are you only referring to being enrolled at Avalon, or—” Arthur started. Then something smacked him in the side and he was too busy trying not to fall into a gigantic life-size pumpkin made of chocolate to continue.

“Pixy Stix!”

Arthur blinked, pasted a smile on his face, and turned around to face…a handful of said candy. He pushed it aside to find a manic Lancelot, grin wide and eyes crazed enough for Arthur to check for possible drugging.

“No, I haven’t been hitting it,” Lancelot irritably said, batting away Arthur’s hand. He snickered and stuffed the candy into the bag Arthur was holding. “At least, not _yet_. Not until we drag Guin out of the office. I swear, she’s positively tolerable when she’s had a few of these.”

“I thought that’s what she was when she’s drunk.” Over Lancelot’s shoulder, Arthur could see Tristan attempting to hide a smile. Of course he could—he wasn’t suffering from the low-grade worry of knowing that a mammoth-size box of the damned Pixy Stix had already shown up in the pantry at home. It had enough sugar to keep Lancelot going till Christmas…when the candycanes came onto the market. Dear God.

Lancelot snorted and pushed past Arthur to eye the rows of chocolates. “Oh, God, no. When she’s drunk, she only gets worse at aiming. It doesn’t make her any less violent. But Pixy Stix? Pixy Stix are a blessing on mankind.”

“They’re nothing but colored sugar,” Arthur said under his breath.

“Hence the utter simplicity of their brilliance.” Something was jiggling against Arthur’s side: Lancelot’s elbow. The jiggle rippled up Lancelot’s arm and down to his toes, which he was incessantly tapping.

“Five,” Tristan suddenly said.

Arthur cocked his head so he could see Lancelot’s eyes again. “Six. And mostly the blue raspberry ones. You still have a little bit—”

At first Lancelot glared at him, but then the other man’s demeanor swiftly lightened. He smiled sweetly and wiped his finger across the corner of his mouth. Then he stuck it in and slowly sucked off the powder traces, swirling his tongue obscenely around the tip.

Tristan pointedly turned around to stare down the aisle. Arthur swallowed hard. Lancelot smirked and swiped a couple loose sticks from Arthur’s bag. He ripped off the top of one and offered it to Arthur. “Cherry? Though I suppose it’s a bit late for that when it comes to me…”

“You are not answering the door. You’ll scare the children.” Before that damnable tongue could mock him anymore, Arthur pivoted his back on it and determinedly went back to chocolate-shopping. Vanora and Kitty were easy, Guinevere’s chocolate he’d already ordered online from a specialty producer, but the annual box Arthur sent to Merlin was proving elusive. Raspberry chocolates tended to put the Dean in a better mood when it came to stamping off on Arthur’s requests or ignoring the grad student conniving with the campus fauna, but the brand Arthur had bought for Merlin for the past five years had apparently been discontinued this year.

“I would not. I’d be educational. Everyone’s always complaining about how commercialized Halloween has gotten, and…oh, jawbreakers. Or as I like to call them…” Thankfully, Lancelot had wandered out of hearing distance before Arthur had heard the rest. Or before he’d thrown a permanent new light on Arthur’s ideas of educating the young.

“The holiday season’s just started,” Tristan said.

Arthur grimaced and doggedly poked at the boxes. One of them nearly toppled to the floor and he snatched it up just in time. “Don’t remind me. I’m still trying to make myself unavailable for any parties. And somehow I ended up agreeing to let Guinevere make Thanksgiving dinner.”

“Any relatives coming down?” Something at the end of the aisle caught Tristan’s eye and he started to move towards it. Then he stopped, paused, and then he turned around to walk back to Arthur.

His behavior was odd enough for Arthur to glance over. It seemed to be innocuous enough, just a display of candy—oh.

That and Tristan’s question collectively managed to throw Arthur for several minutes while he pulled his thoughts together. He realized Tristan wasn’t referring to relatives of him, who no longer were of this earth, and shifted the question’s meaning to its proper context. And he discovered the box of chocolate he was holding would do nicely to satiate Merlin’s sweet tooth.

“From what I gather, Lancelot’s not terribly fond of his father and that’s the only relation he has. Guinevere alternates—this year she stays here and someone’s visiting for Christmas, but they haven’t figured out who yet. I suppose I’ll have to spend an afternoon letting Kitty’s grandchildren terrorize me, but that’s it.” Arthur tucked the box beneath his arm and began to walk down the aisle.

He heard Tristan start to follow, pause again, and then restart more slowly. For a moment, Arthur debated whether or not to push this right now, but by then he was nearly to the display and it would’ve been awkward to turn around. He continued till he was standing in front of it.

“I remember she left me hanging on a stake-out once because she wanted to go buy some of these. Never could understand it—to me these taste more artificial than even Pixy Stix,” Arthur quietly said. He picked up a bag and hefted it, listening to the small bits of candy rearrange themselves inside. “Are you going to drop by on the first like usual, or should I just send over some aspirin?”

After a moment, Tristan reached for a bag. He only held it a moment before he dropped it back on the display and pushed his hands into his pockets. “When was the last time I had a hangover?”

“More times than I’ve seen you with one, but I’m not entirely oblivious to what students get up to.” Hopefully Arthur wouldn’t have to be any more specific than that. He really was not comfortable in interfering with other people’s lives, but sometimes he didn’t see how he couldn’t step in, unless he wanted to watch a wreck in slow motion. “I’ll get this one—did you want a bag?”

Tristan eyed the candy. “I don’t know what Kitty has been putting up as a theory, but Gawain and I are fine. We talked. He and Galahad are moving as soon as they can get out of their lease. I’m not.”

“Kitty doesn’t have the faintest clue, though she’s been prodding.” It occurred to Arthur that Lancelot hadn’t bounced back in a while, and he edged around the shelves to peer down the main aisle. He didn’t see Lancelot, but he did hear a couple women laughing in artificially flirtatious tones.

“It was just a misunderstanding,” Tristan muttered.

Arthur looked heavenwards, then picked up a second bag. “I was always grateful that you seemed to not need the teenage stage of emotional development. Please don’t force me to gain overbearing fatherly skills now.”

“Are you sure that this doesn’t qualify as an ethical transgression?” Normally Tristan didn’t resort to that sort of thing if he didn’t want to talk; he merely refused to answer.

They stared at each other till Lancelot suddenly popped up out of nowhere with a jar of chocolate caramel dipping sauce and the faint scent of perfume clinging to him. The second detail made Arthur swivel and look pointedly at him.

Lancelot hadn’t lost his crazed smile, but it faded a little bit as his eyes curiously ran over them. “My clothes aren’t messy. Stop looking like that, buy me this and go vigorously reaffirm our relationship in the parking garage.”

“I’m not letting you answer the door because I’m not sure who’d be a worse influence on the other,” Arthur retorted, desperately resisting the urge to drop his head in his hands since those were full. After a moment, he put the second bag of candy corn back and began to head for the cashier. They’d definitely spent too much time in this store.

Once the cashier was ringing Arthur up, Lancelot sidled up next to him and leaned in to whisper in Arthur’s ear. “So what was—God! Don’t do that!”

Tristan barely didn’t smirk at him, and clearly avoided looking at Arthur as he dropped the second bag of candy corn on the counter. “Sorry.”

“Don’t…” Arthur started, then shook his head. “Just be careful. And make sure they’re careful—I still want to have grad students come Monday morning.”

“I’ll work on it,” Tristan guardedly replied. He took the candy corn and shoved it into his backpack, then began to walk off. After two steps, he turned around and nodded. “And I’ll be there on the first.”

As soon as Tristan was out of the store, Lancelot shoved an elbow into Arthur’s side. “Meet him where?”

“I’ll tell you later.” Arthur caught the wary flash in Lancelot’s eyes and turned to look fully at him. “I will, I promise. But right now, I need to finish shopping tonight. I’m more or less going to be living in the office till Sunday morning thanks to midterm grading.”

“All right,” Lancelot reluctantly said. He walked a few steps with his head turned nearly completely around so he could watch Tristan disappear into the crowds. His hand slid into Arthur’s bag and pressed through it against Arthur’s hip. “So how many years did he go trick-or-treating as a ninja?”

When they turned a corner, Arthur jerked his bag off of Lancelot’s hand, which he gave a light slap for good measure. He hid a grin at Lancelot’s hurt look. “Stop sneaking those damned Pixy Stix or even tying you down won’t keep you still enough.” He dropped his voice, speaking out of the corner of his mouth as he casually looked around. “And then I’d have to send you in for your weekend of work without a good fuck to tide you over.”

Lancelot’s eyes briefly went dazed and he nearly walked into a streetlight. Of course, he managed to make avoiding it look completely natural, but nevertheless, he was flushing to his ears by the time he rejoined Arthur. “I suppose you used to go as an evil-doer, since you’re a good, guilt-stricken boy the other three hundred and sixty four days of the year.”

“Actually, I was doing my imitation of you.” Arthur ducked into the next store before Lancelot could hit him and started examining lettuce heads. “Why are you going in this time? Last time I talked to Guinevere, I had the impression that you had made a break-through.”

“Well, it broke. They’re better than we thought. Though their timing still is terrible, damn it all. They’re really starting to get on my nerves—on Pellew’s nerves, for that matter. He’s pestering London for more background info. Gotten it into his head that they’re holding something back about this ring.”

Fortunately, the spray over the vegetables started up and neatly hid Arthur’s expression. He’d been doing a little prying about himself regarding the diamond-smuggling ring Lancelot and Guinevere were trying to break, and about his old acquaintance Clayton, but most of the trails within easy reach had long since gone cold. If he wanted more, he’d have to dig, and that would require more…involvement. If Tristan hadn’t been preoccupied, Arthur would have asked him to help out and that would have provided several layers of distance, but things were as they were.

“Personally, I think he’s just gotten paranoid this year. Some covert ops blow-up happened in the Caribbean with some old friends of his, and ever since he’s been getting pricklier and pricklier about London. If anyone’s holding back info, it’d be those wankers in France,” Lancelot went on. He shrugged a shoulder and reached out to finger some carrots. A lady in the next aisle abruptly coughed and hurriedly walked away, shielding her face.

Lancelot snickered. Arthur sighed and tried to hurry up his shopping. “Stop fondling the food.”

“Then give me something else to play with,” Lancelot purred. “Oh, _sausages_.”

Dear God in heaven. There was no way Arthur was letting Lancelot get the door on Sunday night.

* * *

The refrigerator door made a nice wall, but it was too bad the fridge itself was too cold and full for hiding. “Mariette, you want anything? There’s milk, orange juice, beer…Galahad, why do we have a third of a bottle of vodka in here?”

“Because goddamn it, I knew I forgot to buy something.” Paper rustled and things clunked as Galahad plopped his bag on the counter. He reached in and started pulling out enough alcohol to fuel a frat house for a month. “Oh, well. You can still make Jell-O shots with other stuff.”

“Do I want to know how much you just dropped for that? Especially since we had the damned time coming up with the deposit for the new place?” Gawain closed the fridge and sat down on the floor, resting his arms on his knees. If he got up, he had a feeling he was going to hurt Galahad.

Who made a face at him and waved a hand as if to fan him. “Chill, would you? I spent all of twelve dollars for the Jell-O boxes. Everything else I got from Bed in trade—I just got his Mac and graphics software fixed, remember?”

“Graphics software? I thought he worked with metal,” Mariette said. She couldn’t seem to make up her mind whether to stare at how Galahad’s arm muscles were bunching or at…

Gawain ran his hand over his face, then glanced at his reflection in the chrome of the stove door. Nope, nothing wrong there, and his clothes were fine, so he didn’t know what she could find so interesting.

“It’s for the garage. He can do these models of car engines and show you how he’ll soup up your ride—awesome stuff. Here, stick these in the fridge, okay? Thanks.” Galahad pushed a bottle at Mariette, head still deep in the paper bag.

She picked it up, skimmed the label and then cautiously walked over to the fridge. After Gawain had moved aside for her, she opened the door. “Did you come in at all today?” she diffidently asked.

“Just to pick up my share of the grading. I don’t have classes or office hours today, so I figured I’d work from here. And I did actually work, okay? Unlike some people, I don’t use going back to my place as an excuse to—”

“Hey!” When Gawain looked up, Galahad was scowling at him. “Look, _calm_ down. Just because you’re in a shitty mood doesn’t mean you have to take it out on Mariette.”

Mariette jerked up her head and shot Galahad a look that said something in big block capitals. “I think he was more attacking you.”

“Well, whatever. The point is, he needs to knock it off.” Now that Galahad had emptied out the bag, he quickly sorted the various bottles and boxes into two groups, the larger of which he began transferring back into the bag. “He’s the one that needs a beer.”

“He’s right here,” Gawain muttered. He pressed his hand against his forehead, then looked up. “But Galahad’s right. Sorry, Mariette.”

She blinked at him, then hurriedly put the bottle away. “It’s fine. Are you doing anything tonight?”

“What she means is: we’re going out, she wants company that isn’t just me, and you need to get out for a bit before you start getting moldy.” Galahad put in the last bottle, then collected up the stuff that was still left on the counter and stashed it away in a cabinet. “I know you two are glaring at me. Knock it off. If I’d let you guys talk it out, we’d be here all night, and the first party I know of starts in a half-hour.”

“There’s no point in saying no, is there?” Very slowly, Gawain got to his feet. He looked over himself again, then decided to hell with changing. He looked okay, and since he didn’t really want to go in the first place, he wasn’t going to make the effort to look good. Mostly he was about to agree to this because Mariette was actually looking at Galahad as if she was a tiny bit scared out of her wits. “This doesn’t mean you can depend on me to drag your ass back if you pass out.”

As usual, Galahad ignored the sarcasm and focused on the part that sounded helpful to him. “Great! Let’s go.”

“Do I need to change?” Mariette asked, worriedly patting at her hair.

Galahad gave her a once-over as he picked up the bag, then shook his head and went for the door. “Nah. This is college, not a ballroom. No one’s ever seen you in jeans before, so there’s your costume.”

“Excuse me?” She started to charge after him, then turned back. “Gawain?”

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Gawain sighed. “And yeah, go ahead and hit him. As long as he’s still alive when we sign the lease papers, I don’t mind.”

The party was loud, drunken and had way too many fake spiderwebs up for Gawain’s peace of mind. He got his one drink from Galahad so he knew it wasn’t adulterated, then beat a quick retreat to the nearest quiet spot. That turned out to be the roof.

He got snuggled down in his corner and sipped at the beer. Listened to the music thud up through the concrete, and the people laughing, and told himself for the millionth time that he was really, really stupid. He’d messed up, and even if he and Tristan had talked about it, talking didn’t reverse time. The fact that it’d happened and Gawain had been such a moron was still there. The fact that he still didn’t quite get what’d happened also was still there. So he’d jumped the gun a little bit, and apparently it’d been a lousy day for Tristan—that was still a pretty strong reaction for Tristan to have.

He’d thought about asking Arthur about it, but Arthur was so good at avoiding any reference to Tristan that Gawain had always forgotten during their meetings. Which was a good thing, because that would have been really stupid of him. But he was getting just that desperate. On the surface, everything was okay, but beneath they were just letting this thing get bigger and bigger, and if Gawain didn’t figure out what to do soon it was just going to…

…he stared at the chipmunk. Then he turned around. And around, but the roof was empty; it was pretty windy tonight and it was still too early for people to be drunk enough not to care about that, so he wasn’t surprised. Just a little disappointed.

“Gawain?”

“Jesus!” Gawain scrambled back and made sure both his knees and his hands were on the ground. Then he slowly crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over.

Tristan stared back up. He was standing on the balcony with what looked like a bag of candy in his hand, and he was getting pushed around by the other people milling about there. A girl suddenly fell—well, sort of past him, but she was far gone enough in her beer that she probably didn’t feel it.

“What are you doing—oh, that’s where he got to?” Galahad pushed his way through till he was beside Tristan and squinting upward. “Gawain, get down already. And help me find Mariette before you go, okay?”

“Right. _Right_.” God, Gawain was slow tonight. He got up and—and almost stepped on the stupid chipmunk. After a quick hop, he made for the door.

* * *

Galahad cursed again, then knocked on the door. “Mariette?”

Vomiting sound.

“What did you drink? Did anyone give it to you? Did it taste funny?” For Christ’s sake, it wasn’t like he could have ignored Helen without coming off like a total dickwad. He’d already spent a week as the campus jackass and he hadn’t felt like repeating that experience, so he’d stopped to say hi. And anyway, when that one guy had asked if Galahad and Mariette had come together, she’d said _no_ so fast the word had burned a streak across Galahad’s cheek. “Come on. Give me something to work with, here.”

The door suddenly swung open and Mariette’s glower shoved into Galahad’s face. Her hair was down and it looked great; the rest of her face was the scariest thing he’d seen all year. “I did not drink anything. I had a brownie. It tasted awful.”

“Oh—oh, fuck. Um. How fast did you throw it back up?” Oh, great. And of course Gawain and Tristan had to take off on some midnight road trip right when Galahad could have used some help. He hoped he was remembering right about pot taking longer to work if it was eaten instead of smoked.

“Two minutes later.” Mariette backed into the room and tried to slam the door in Galahad’s face, but he slipped in fast. She seemed about to complain, but then she turned around and started splashing water on her face.

Galahad thought a minute. “You’re probably okay, then.”

“No, I’m not,” she snapped. The water smacked off her hands so hard that some of it splattered Galahad. “I’ve been here six months and I still don’t know anyone and people only pay attention to you if you drink and I want to go _home_.”

And then, of all things, she put her head down and sobbed into the sink.

For a moment Galahad stared. Then he realized his mouth was hanging open and pulled that shut. He felt like he was supposed to say something, but damned if he knew what. “Um…”

She lifted her head. Her reddened eyes darted around, landed on the cup he was holding and she grabbed it. Drank it before he could even yelp.

“That—that was a quadruple Jell-O shot!” Galahad finally said. “Christ, Mariette. Everyone gets homesick, but you didn’t have to do that.”

“You’re just upset that it was yours. And you think you’re going to have sex with me. Well, you’re not.” The alcohol got to her fast, because by the time she had straightened all the way up, she was swaying. Mariette sort of danced forward and fluttered her hands on Galahad’s shoulders. “My parents would _hate_ you, if they knew I was seeing you. So you’re not.”

God, she really had no tolerance. And goddamn it, Gawain was so much better at dealing with the drunken confessional mood than Galahad was. “Okay…”

Which was when she kissed him. Her tongue came out and went in and generally just went wild; Galahad made a muffled protest and her hand suddenly grabbed at his crotch.

“Holy _shi_ \--okay, no, no, no.” He whipped her off of him and backed up fast, only to hit the door. His elbow banged right against the knob and he cursed and made the mistake of not moving.

She was on him again, and if she hadn’t been so damn drunk and, well, tearstained, he might’ve gotten into it. But there was one rule Grandma Yvie had managed to get into Galahad, it was that sex didn’t help clean the tears off a girl’s face. Given his mother’s track record with that, he’d long since figured that was damn right.

He got Mariette by the shoulders and pried her off again. This time, he wedged her to the side while he scrambled to get the door open. “Look, it’s not that I actually wouldn’t if you were sober and not so annoying, but Professor Cobham and Arthur would kill me. Gawain would kill me once he and Tristan make up. Hell, _Vanora_ would kill me.”

“My parents are snobs. I thought New York would be far enough, but they’re still so irritating!” Mariette was saying. And squeezing at Galahad’s ass, and plastering his jaw with sloppy kisses. “I never had friends because of them, and I still don’t even though they’re not here.”

“Uh, well, Gawain does kind of like you. And—okay, stop grabbing at my fucking balls,” Galahad muttered. At that, a couple heads started to turn and he swore in Spanish. He looked around, spotted a fast-closing hole in the crowd and squirted them through it.

“And you know what they did? With the first boy I ever brought home? You know what—” Right about there, Mariette broke into French and kept on in it while they stumbled down the sidewalk to her car. 

This was mostly a Puerto Rican neighborhood, so the people giving them weird looks probably didn’t understand what she was saying, but that didn’t stop them from loudly giving Galahad suggestions about what to do with Mariette. He ignored them and flopped her into the car, nodding whenever she seemed to be demanding an answer from him.

“Jesus fucking Christ, this is great. This is just great,” he muttered as he started the car. “Would you just fucking pass out?”

Mariette had started making gestures to illustrate her points. She was in the middle of a big complicated waving one when Galahad began to pull away from the curb. A couple suddenly stumbled in front and Galahad slammed on the brakes, which started a chain reaction that ended in Mariette slumping over his lap, a bruise swelling on her head.

Galahad leaned forward and banged his head against the steering wheel. They might as well fucking match, given their non-relationship relationship.

* * *

“Want some?” Tristan offered the bag to Gawain.

“Oh, candy corn! I love this stuff.” Which sounded really cheerful and really fake, which both were really, really out of place if one was standing in the middle of a cemetery like they were. Wincing, Gawain dumped a bunch of the candy in his mouth so he wouldn’t be able to talk himself early into the grave.

But even then it wasn’t all right, because the place was dark and chilly, and the shadows kept shifting in ways that made him stare constantly about them. He wanted to keep close to Tristan, and not only because he’d missed him, but Gawain couldn’t quite work up to it. His chewing seemed to echo weirdly as they silently walked across the grass.

“Hey!”

“Holy fucking—” Gawain dropped like a shot towards the ground and started to spin to face the voice, but something caught him by the elbow.

After a moment of mutual staring, Tristan awkwardly pulled him back up. “Aaron? It’s me.”

“Tristan? Damn it, should’ve been expecting you—I was going to have some cider ready, but then I heard some hooligans tramping around and came out to check. Goddamn kids…no respect for the dead.” A man materialized from behind a towering gravestone. He was carrying one of those skull-crusher metal flashlights and a shovel, so of course he looked terrifying.

“I’m early anyway. Arthur and I will be around tomorrow, so you’ll catch me then.” A little wave, which was returned, and then Tristan was pulling Gawain towards a dark hunch of a building. His hand gradually worked its way down Gawain’s arm till they were holding hands.

Gawain cautiously wrapped his fingers around Tristan’s. “Was that…the caretaker?”

“Yeah.” The door to the building was locked and Gawain was expecting the usual lockpicking magic, but instead Tristan pulled out an actual key. He slid it in, then pushed the door open and pulled them through.

Thankfully, there were lights and the lights went on. When Gawain’s eyes had adjusted, he saw that they were in some kind of…he didn’t remember what it was called, but it was a place that stored ashes. Neat plaques lined the walls, listing names and dates. Some of them had quotes, some had little decorations like angels and flowers on it.

Tristan dropped Gawain’s hand; Gawain jerked his head around, but Tristan was staring fixedly at a spot on the wall. He raised the bag of candy corn and took out a couple, then put them one by one into his mouth, more like a ritual than like he was doing it out of enjoyment.

Gawain leaned forward and squinted at the plaque. “Lizabetta…Cornwell.”

He checked the dates. Did some half-assed math in his head. Then he looked at Tristan.

“We—guessed for the last name. It’s the best Arthur could do—she never told me that,” Tristan muttered. He tilted the bag so a few bright candies dropped into the little flower holder installed by the side of the plaque. “We used to light candles for whoever my father was on All Hallows’ Day. Now Arthur and I do it for both of them.”

It was on the tip of Gawain’s tongue to ask if Tristan had ever found out who his father was before his mother had died, but growing up with Galahad had taught him better. He kept his mouth shut, but his hands kept moving. After a lot of debate, he hesitantly reached for Tristan’s hand.

“There’s no ashes back there. But when Arthur decided we were going to stay here for…a long while, anyway, he thought we should put something up. I—didn’t thank him.” Tristan didn’t seem to notice Gawain’s hand, but he was squeezing it very hard. His face remained mostly expressionless, but something was struggling behind his eyes. “I—can’t talk much about—her. And—but she told—you’re supposed to keep moving. Stay too long—it’s dangerous. It was dangerous.”

“I’m sorry,” Gawain said again. Lamely, but that was what he had. “I really shouldn’t have—”

Tristan lifted his head and stared straight ahead. “I love you,” he said, very clear and distinct.

Gawain dropped his head and resisted the urge to shuffle his feet on the ground. “Um. Maybe I should step outside—”

“I was talking to you,” Tristan replied, turning to look at him.

“Oh.” Well…Gawain would have slapped himself if he hadn’t been holding Tristan’s hand. “Christ, I…you know I love you, right? You always seem to know…it’s just I didn’t know whether you can…you know, say that kind of thing. That’s asskicking stuff back in L. A., but—yeah. I do. I love you. I’m just really bad at talking right now…”

“I know.” Tristan put his hand up so his fingertips just touched Gawain’s cheek. Then he dropped it, but leaned forward so their foreheads rested against each other. “I am, too. I can’t—about her and the apartment you were talking about—it’s—closer than anyone’s ever—”

“It’s okay. Really. I can wait. And I’ll be less stupid this time,” Gawain said, cupping Tristan’s face in his hands. He slid his fingers into Tristan’s hair and pressed his lips gently against Tristan’s mouth, then slid back. “I…damn. I feel like I should have dressed up, or something.”

The laugh that came from Tristan was quiet but unrestrained, and suddenly it really was okay. It was all good again.

* * *

Galahad lifted the icepack from Mariette’s head. “The swelling’s going down. You feeling up to swallowing some aspirin?”

“You’re good at this,” she groaned. Her hand flailed around on the couch, then settled on the glass Galahad was resting on his knee. After a moment, she got herself up and drank a little of the water in it.

“Well, I’m a nasty mother-scaring hoodlum, remember?” He turned around to get the aspirin, and when he turned back, she was laughing into his leg. It tickled and did some other things so he had to yank down his shirt-tails. “Oh, good. You’re back to bitchy. I didn’t know how I was going to explain to Cobham how her grad student suddenly turned normal.”

She stopped laughing and looked plaintively up at him. “Am I that bad?”

Oh, fuck. Goddamn his mouth sometimes—Gawain was occasionally right about that, Galahad had to admit. Instead of answering, he passed her the aspirin.

“I am, aren’t I? Mon Dieu…tu sais, when my car broke down that one time, it was because I was driving around because I was out of work and I didn’t know anyone I could call. I was in your neighborhood on purpose—you were the only people I really knew, other than Kitty and Arthur. I should go home.” Her head flopped back into the couch as soon as the aspirin was down. She went on mumbling French in a depressed tone.

Galahad picked up the aspirin bottle again and shook himself out a couple, then dry-swallowed them. He hadn’t done it in a while and choked a little, but they went down. “No, you’re not…you look better with your hair down. I mean literally, not figuratively. Figuratively, you’re scarier like this than you ever were when you were throwing feminist philosophy at my head.”

“I wouldn’t throw it if you respected women better. You fuck and you fuck and you fuck—what are you looking for? If you’ve already fucked so much, then it is obvious that it is not there, right?” It sounded like her head was getting itself back together. Pretty quick, but then again, Mariette wasn’t exactly the kind of girl that broke in a light breeze. Actually, it must have taken a lot to make her snap like this.

“For your information, I haven’t fucked in a couple weeks.” He stared down her arched brow. “Because ‘we are not going to have sex,’ remember?”

Mariette tilted her head to squint at him. Then she turned over on her side and walked her head out till it was covering Galahad’s. “My parents really would scream if they knew about you. They might even make me come home. I don’t need their money anymore—well, probably not. I have a scholarship.”

“Don’t do that. Having no parents isn’t just about having no bankroll to save you,” Galahad said. He stared at the wall and wondered how much of this was her baring her soul and how much of it was finally rebelling against her parents.

“You’re nice when you try,” Mariette finally replied, voice barely above a whisper. She tugged at his hand.

He pulled it away and got up. For a moment he stood around like an ass, and then he spotted a blanket to toss at her. “You can crash here.”

When he walked into the kitchen, he saw that it was almost morning. So much for Friday night.

The door opened behind him, and Gawain came through looking like he’d been recharged and given a mint afterward, just because. He stopped and looked Galahad up and down. “You’re sober? And Mariette’s car is still out front.”

“Shut up. She’s sleeping it off in my room, so keep it down or she’ll hurl CDs at us.” Galahad opened the fridge and started thinking about breakfast. “Are you going to stop being a dishrag about Tristan now?”

“Shut up. And here, give me that. You make awful pancakes,” Gawain said cheerfully, reaching for the milk.

* * *

After the candles had burned halfway-down, Arthur and Tristan lifted their heads.

“Thanks,” Tristan said.

“You’re welcome.” Arthur stooped to pinch out the candles, but was stopped by a hand on his arm.

“No. Thank you,” Tristan repeated. He put a different emphasis on the words.

Arthur smiled, then took care of the candles. “You’re welcome.” He handed one candle to Tristan and kept the other one for himself. “She’d be proud of you, you know. And he would.”

Tristan ducked his head and paused, then turned away. “Galahad finally got his hang-over. I was going to pick up some aspirin for Gawain.”

“Then I won’t keep you. I need to get home anyway—both of them have indigestion. No surprise considering…” Shaking his head, Arthur led them back to the car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The palindrome is from Biochemistry, Donald and Judith G. Voet.


	5. Home Appliances

Galahad walked into the kitchen with his eyes closed, put water and coffee into the coffeemaker, and then went over to the table to collapse. A second later, he jerked up his head and stared wildly at an amused Gawain. “What the hell is that? When did we get it?”

Gawain’s amusement began to fade in favor of exasperation. “It’s a blender.” He took off the top and picked up the banana and yoghurt container next to him. “See, you dump in fruit and this, add some honey, and you can make a nice breakfast fast. Which you need, given your habit of barely waking up in time.”

“It’s not a habit—it’s an art,” Galahad muttered. He squinted at the blender as if it might leap up and attack him. “What about my other question?”

“Tristan brought it over. Somebody in his group is moving and was selling off their stuff, and he remembered I wanted one of these.” The smoothie had turned a nice pale yellow color and Gawain couldn’t see any chunks floating around in it, so he figured it was done. He twisted the blender off its stand and poured out two cups, one of which he pushed at Galahad.

The other man slowly got up and came at the cup sideways, like he was stalking a dangerous animal. He finally picked it up and took a cautious sip. Then he took a bigger one. “Almost like we’re back in California. Have I mentioned how much I’m not enjoying the idea of fall?”

“A little frost isn’t going to kill you,” Gawain snorted.

Galahad looked dubious, but he finished his smoothie in record time. Apparently he wasn’t all that cautious about that anymore. “Hey. Wait. Tristan showed up after ten last night. So what did he do, carry this thing through the streets?”

“I guess. Why?” Gawain asked. “What? It can’t be any weirder than you coming home drunk and having to puke every ten feet.”

“Hey, that’s normal for college. I’m just surprised he didn’t shock some poor old lady to death with his shadow…or maybe he did, and we just don’t know.” As he spoke, Galahad dropped his voice to what he thought ‘creepy’ should sound like; Gawain rolled his eyes and Galahad laughed. He dropped the cup in the sink and headed for the bathroom.

A moment later, a slightly more embarrassed Galahad stuck his head into the hall and mumbled something. He flushed when Gawain asked him to repeat it louder. “Tell him I’ll help with the bail when they find the body,” he said.

Gawain threw a dishrag at Galahad, then subsided to grin to himself. It was pretty damn close to a vow of eternal gratitude for Galahad. Not bad how far they had come in eight months.


End file.
